~ Musings of a Bean Counter

Intercompany

.. it appears that there is some confusion as to what intercompany is, with regards to invoicing received from a sister company.

I am in the process of working my way through a quarter-end and have the dubious joy of having to explain a $421K intercompany variance. Seems the twerps up in Marketing/Account Management received some invoicing, but never bothered to process them in time for the end of March. The excuse I get is – oops, sorry, I didn’t realise it was intercompany. These twerps have been here for a long while and are fully aware that the company that billed us is in point of fact a sister company.

Now I have to explain a $421K variance in intercompany. I can easily say it’s a timing issue, but in reality this could cause several alarm bells to ring with regards to reporting and auditing issues. On the surface the sister company can appear to be inflating its revenues by billing me, and in turn I could appear like I am understating costs which in turn inflates my PBT.

What I will probably do is when it comes time for me to do my reporting, even though the invoices have not entered the accounting system, I will report correctly by manually manipulating the reporting system by added an extra CR to InterCo Payables and DR WIP — all on the balance sheet. I hate having to do that, but I have to. Even though the invoices did not go through the system, I have to report my liabilities and WIP accurately and in a timely manner.